Just a fact finding mission

Has anyone ever had problems with the 83 and prior outer front wheel bearings. I couple of people have told me they are a weak link in the front suspension. So in 84 they changed the outer front wheel bearing for a better designed piece.

The only reason I'm wondering is that I will be changing my front wheel bearings on my 83 soon but am thinking of upgrading to the 84-85 spindle and bearings.

Any comments or suggestions are appreciated.

 

Quite a while ago I owned a '79 Limited. Sold it wilth 120,000 miles to a friend of mine who had it a couple of more years. Never any problems with front end components.

 

this is a known problem but many never see it, me included so far. i would say don't worry about it until you have a problem. then keep the suspension upgrade in mind.

 

I have over 150,000 miles including 2 years of track use only and those front wheel bearings are fine. Just relube them every year and check for pitting/galling and replace if needed.

If you want to upgrade to the larger wheel bearing you'll need the whole spindle/back plate/strut carrier tube. Not cheap.

Some of the 3-12hr enduro racing guys say to upgrade to larger bearings but street use puts no where near the load on them.

-bp-